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Hi all,

In general terms, it seems that "to be going to" is used for a plan that's already been made at the time of speaking (ex. "We're going to have drinks later on tonight") and that "will" is used to express a decision made at the moment of speaking (ex. "We ran out of sugar. I'll go to the store to buy some"). But then there are cases that can be EITHER, supposedly these cases are when they are used to "predict the future". Could you guys give me some examples of this type of sentence, because I can't seem to tell the difference between sentences where there is a prior plan (must use "be going to") and those that predict the future (can use either "be going to" or "will"). Thanks!

Alexanndra wrote:Hi all,

In general terms, it seems that "to be going to" is used for a plan that's already been made at the time of speaking (ex. "We're going to have drinks later on tonight") and that "will" is used to express a decision made at the moment of speaking (ex. "We ran out of sugar. I'll go to the store to buy some"). But then there are cases that can be EITHER, supposedly these cases are when they are used to "predict the future". Could you guys give me some examples of this type of sentence, because I can't seem to tell the difference between sentences where there is a prior plan (must use "be going to") and those that predict the future (can use either "be going to" or "will"). Thanks!

I had a professor (she is American, therefore a
native speaker) and she told me that the basic difference is that one uses 'be going to' when speaking and 'will' when writing, it is her opinion.

Now, I passed through all these explanations/ theories of when using 'be going to' or 'will' and I am drawing to a conclusion that in the end the choice would be just stylistic. just a prefference of the spekear, I am not a native and it's just a hunch that I am projecting in my mind for clarefy and stablish my knowledge, of courese, it will always be open for reviewing, modifying, adding and leaving behind.

José

Hi,

1. A: Let's have a party.
B: That's a great idea. We'll invite lots of people.
2. A: Peter and I have decided to have a party.
B: We're going to invite lots of people.

will: when we decide to do something at the time of speaking
going to: when we have already decided to do something

These concepts are what I was told in high school, and I teach them to my students now as well.

William

Metamorfose wrote:
Now, I passed through all these explanations/ theories of when using 'be going to' or 'will' and I am drawing to a conclusion that in the end the choice would be just stylistic. just a prefference of the spekear, I am not a native and it's just a hunch that I am projecting in my mind for clarefy and stablish my knowledge, of courese, it will always be open for reviewing, modifying, adding and leaving behind.

José

Oddly enough, I, as a native speaker, used to think/teach that there was no difference between "be going to" and "will". However, somewhere along the way I read a few grammar books and realized there are some instances where one is better. For example:

The teacher asks for volunteers to get up in front of the class and answer questions. John, an eager beaver type, raises his hand and says, "I'll do it." That's the example of deciding at the moment of speaking. "I'm going to do it." isn't correct in this example.

The class is going to have a party, and the teacher asks who wants to bring the soda. Mary says, "I'll bring it." and the teacher agrees. A little later, Bob says, "I'll bring the soda." Mary says, "No, I'm going to bring it." because she already has the plan in place.

“Will” and “be going to” are different concepts. Despite the fact that some people think they either mean the same thing, or one is used when someone has a prior plan and the other when a decision is made at the moment of speaking, we can’t forget that one of them, “will”, is a modal auxiliary (with all of the characteristics of modals) and the other is not. All modal auxiliaries express the speaker’s personal judgment of the situation he is speaking about. A sentence like, “Susan lives in Atlanta.” can be said to be about Susan, because she is the subject of the sentence. However, a sentence like, “Susan will come tomorrow.” is different. It is not only about Susan, it is also about the speaker, because the speaker asserts that it is his opinion that Susan comes tomorrow. “Will” does not necessarily implicate the future, because it is entirely normal to encounter such sentences as, “They surely will be home by now.” This sentence is clearly not referring to the future, but rather to now. However, the statement does express the speaker’s opinion about whether “they” are home. He also, with the use of “will”, acknowledges that he does not know for sure. At the present time, he has no way to know. If he did, he would simply say, "They are home." That is the essence of the meaning of “will”. In the frequent instances where it is used to refer to future events, it is exactly because no one can know what happens in the future that it works.

“Be going to” is prospective, that is, it always looks into future time. It expresses that the speaker believes he has evidence (possibly a plan, possibly an observation) that the event he refers to is already underway in some respect, and must inevitably result unless something intervenes. For example, if Jack looks out of the window and sees dark clouds approaching he might say, “It’s going to rain.” It would be extremely unusual if he said * “It will rain.” The reason is that it would be strange for him to observe the clouds and then say something suggesting that he has no way of knowing. Here’s another example: Martha sees little Jimmy walking along on the top of a short brick wall, and says to his mother, “Jimmy will fall if he’s not careful.” She doesn’t really know if he’ll fall, but she has reason to fear it. However, if she sees Jimmy beginning to teeter and wave his arms wildly, she might then shout, “Look out, he’s going to fall.” In this case, she has evidence that the fall is already coming, although it hasn’t happened yet. Martha would not say, * “…he will fall.” in this last situation, for the reasons outlined above.

So, to begin where we started, “will” and “be going to” are different…right from the get go.

Larry Latham

1. "I will be sick"

2. "I'll be sick"

3. "I'm going to be sick"

In which of these three cases do you not want to be standing directly in front of the speaker?

In which is the speaker making an "immediate decision at the moment of speaking"?

In which is the speaker emphasising a personal desire and determination to be sick?

There may be more than one correct answer to each of these questions...

szwagier, you are a breath of fresh air
Iain

dduck wrote:szwagier, you are a breath of fresh air
Iain

Before or after being sick?

Thanks

Hmmm...what a can of worms!

So would it be safe to say that "will" is sort of a consequence, "If you study hard, you will do well in your exam", and "going to" is for more imminent situations, as in "Oh no, Jack's going to fall!"?

Umm, I don't think so, Alexanndra. There's nothing grammatically or semantically wrong with saying "The world is going to end on January 1st 2550", and it's only pragmatically wrong in the sense that, as far as I'm aware, there's absolutely no truth in it.

What Larry wrote earlier, which (correct me if I'm wrong, Larry) is based on Lewis' The English Verb seems to me to have the ring of truth about it - there is definitely something "looking forward"-ish about "going to". This is categorically not the same as Future, because "he was going to be there by now" is a perfectly acceptable utterance and there's no future time reference. What there is is an idea that his being there is a result or consequence of some prior event or state.

Will, and all the modals, actually, seem to me to be much less clear, although what Larry says about will not necessarily relating to the future also seems indisputable.

There are two things I feel quite confident about, though. Will is not the same as going to, and will is not the same (in spoken English) as 'll.

Incidentally, this question has been bugging me for about a decade now, so I, too, would be very grateful if someone could throw some more light on it.

szwagier, by my reckoning, you are right on all counts.

Alexanndra, if I'm reading you right, you might be falling into the trap of thinking that timing has something to do with the choice between "will" and "be going to". There's nothing about one of them being more imminent than the other one in this choice. Rather, if one chooses (as szwagier has so colorfully proposed above):

I'm going to be sick.

...it means he believes he has evidence (in this case in the form of a certain well known feeling in the pit of his stomach, together with a sense of twiching in his abdominal muscles) of an inevitable event already in the making.

On the other hand, saying:

"I'll just be sick if I don't get an "A" on this test."

...probably means something like: If I don't get the "A" I most likely will feel terrible at that time (here "will" is being used to refer to a future time) because that's what usually happens when I don't get an "A", although, since that is in the future, I recognize that I don't really know for sure how I'll feel then.

This difference is not always intuitive, so most of us need to spend a little time with it, observing for ourselves a series of examples from the English we see and hear in order to make it clear. It does get clearer, though, after you've rolled it around in your brain for a while.

Larry Latham

Yes, Larry, but couldn't you also say "I'm going to be sick if I don't get an A" falling into the "predictions" category of sentence, therefore allowing the use of either "will" or "going to"?

To make my question clearer, here's the situation I'm having in class:

Willingness, or decision at the moment of speaking is fine: "Why don't you ask Larry, he'll help you"

Prior plans is pretty much clear, too: "I bought 10 gallons of paint, because I am going to paint my room."

However, predictions of the future (where one can use "will" OR "be going to") is causing a revoultion: "Sue will/is going to graduate in June". According to my textbook, that is a prediction, but my students argue that it is not a prediction, but rather a prior plan of Sue's, and therefore should only be used with "going to". The only kind of sentence they accept as a prediction are one's like "the Dow Jones will/is going to rise 10 points tomorrow". I don't know what to say to them...any advice? Also, if the above sentence about Sue were changed to "I am going to graduate in June" would that still be a prediction, or would it change to a prior plan??? I guess my point is that in reality, ALL prior plans are in fact predictions, because we never REALLY know if our prior plans will happen or not. See my confusion?

Indeed I do, Alexanndra. But I don't think it's too severe. At least I hope I can help to shed some light on the confusion.

Perhaps one big part of the problem is the use of terminology. What do the textbooks mean when they say "prediction"? Does it always mean that the speaker is looking into future time to suppose something 'will happen'? Or could we reword it a bit to say that a prediction occurs when a speaker feels he is in possession of certain knowledge that leads him to believe that some particular thing or event is true, but at the same time, because of the circumstances pertaining at the moment, has no possibility of being absolutely certain about it. I know that is a bit of a mouthful, and sort of roundabout, but it allows for such expressions as:

"I'm sure they'll be asleep by now." (not looking into the future)

On the other hand, a speaker may believe his present knowledge constitutes evidence that a consequence is already underway in some important respect. His "prediction", then, about that result, is merely what he sees as the inevitable outcome of events already in progress. In other words, he is just looking ahead to point out what will surely happen unless something intervenes to stop the events already underway.

Sometimes, it may be possible in particular speaking situations for a speaker to look at something in either way. The choice is up to him, hence you may have occasions where a speaker could either say "will" OR he could look at it differently and say "be going to". Those are likely to be rare occasions, however, because if you look at a large number of occasions where "prediction" is involved, most will fall naturally one way or the other. The opposite point-of-view for the speaker would seem strange. An example of this is: "It's going to rain." In the circumstances where a person might say this, given the occurance of dark clouds in the distance, it would be extremely unlikely that he would view this as fitting the situation where "will" would be appropriate. He is not likely to say: "It will rain."

OK, let's now look at the sentences and situations you have proposed. In the case of "I'm going to be sick if I don't get an 'A'." it seems to me that this speaker, since she is speaking about herself, is in full control of whether to look at it as something that is probably true, but she can't know for sure since she doesn't yet know if she has the 'A', or whether she is actually "planning" to be sick...it's just a matter of time. So she, in this case, can say it either way:

"I'll just be sick if......." (she thinks so, but she's not sure)
"I'm going to be sick if...." (she "knows" what happens when she gets poor grades, and she's just waiting for it to happen this time)

"Why don't you ask Larry, he'll help you." is pretty clear, as you say. This speaker has no way to assume that Larry's help is already coming. She may assume that Larry will help, on the basis of past experience with Larry, but she really has no way to know for sure. It fits the use of "will".

The same clarity (as you point out) is available in the case of, "...I'm going to paint my room." In this case, her knowledge of her own plan (particularly because she views it as already underway, since she has already purchased the paint) makes it reasonable for her to view 'painting her room' as an inevitable outcome. Something that she feels is sure to happen.

"Sue will graduate in June."
"Sue is going to graduate in June."

I believe that a speaker looking at this situation could see it in either of two ways: (1) when June arrives, Sue 'probably' graduates (but then, who knows?), or (2) Sue is already on track to graduate. She has completed all her required classes, and is getting good grades in the last group of classes she's taking now, so graduation appears to be a sure thing.

Does this long, involved 'explanation' help you at all, Alexanndra? I hope it does. It seems clear to me now, but I'll admit it took some time for me to absorb the distinction between 'inevitable outcome' and 'probable, but unknowable outcome'. Good luck with your students. They sound like a great class because it sounds as if they are really "involved" with your teaching. That's wonderful.

Larry Latham

OK, that would sound pretty convincing Larry, except for the fact that we just finished an exercise where we used "will+verb" for things that are SURE to happen and "will probably+verb" for things that are likely to happen! ("the sun WILL rise tomorrow morning" vs. "I will probably get up at 7:00). Following your logic, it should have been "the sun IS GOING TO rise tomorrow morning" and although that does sound more natural, "the sun WILL rise tomorrow morning" doesn't sound incorrect to me... does it to you? More food for thought....

I don't think sureness or certainty are the issue here - "the sun WILL PROBABLY rise tomorrow morning" and "the sun IS PROBABLY GOING TO rise tomorrow morning" are both OK, as you pointed out.

The pragmatic effect on the listener/reader is the same in this case, but as a lot of the previous examples have shown, that's not always true ("Larry'll help you" v "Larry's going to help you").

How about thinking of "will" (emphatically not 'll) in the archaic sense of "I will this to happen" - I'm engaging my personal will (as a noun) and determination to make this true.

Contrast that with "this is going to happen" - I have no control over it, and, whether I will it (want it) or not, I think it's pre-ordained.

Is that any better?